Cellular communications systems are commonly employed to provide voice and data communications to a plurality of mobile units or subscribers. Analog cellular systems, such as designated AMPS, ETACS, NMT-450, and NMT-900, have been deployed successfully throughout the world. More recently, digital cellular systems such as designated IS-54B in North America and the pan-European GSM system have been introduced. These systems, and others, are described, for example, in the book titled Cellular Radio Systems by Balston, et al., published by Artech House, Norwood, Mass., 1993.
Frequency reuse is commonly employed in cellular technology wherein groups of frequencies are allocated for use in regions of limited geographic coverage known as cells. Cells containing equivalent groups of frequencies are geographically separated to allow mobile units in different cells to simultaneously use the same frequency without interfering with each other. By so doing, many thousands of subscribers may be served by a system of only several hundred frequencies.
In the United States, for example, Federal authorities have allocated to cellular communications a block of the UHF frequency spectrum further subdivided into pairs of narrow frequency bands called channels. Channel pairing results from the frequency duplex arrangement wherein the transmit and receive frequencies in each pair are offset by 45 MHz. At present there are 832, 30-KHz wide, radio channels allocated to cellular mobile communications in the United States. To address the capacity limitations of this analog system a digital transmission standard has been provided, designated IS-54B, wherein these frequency channels are further subdivided into 3 time slots.
As illustrated in FIG. 1, a cellular communication system 20 as in the prior art includes one or more mobile stations or units 21, one or more base stations 23 and a mobile telephone switching office (MTSO) 25. Although only three cells 36 are shown in FIG. 1, a typical cellular network may comprise hundreds of base stations, thousands of mobile stations and more than one MTS0. Each cell will have allocated to it one or more dedicated control channels and one or more voice channels. A typical cell may have, for example, one control channel, and 21 voice/data, or traffic, channels. The control channel is a dedicated channel used for transmitting cell identification and paging information. The traffic channels carry the voice and data information.
The MTSO 25 is the central coordinating element of the overall cellular network 20. It typically includes a cellular processor 28, a cellular switch 29 and also provides the interface to the public switched telephone network (PSTN) 30. Through the cellular network 20, a duplex radio communication link 32 may be effected between two mobile stations 21 or, between a mobile station 21 and a landline telephone user 33. The function of the base station 23 is commonly to handle the radio communication with the mobile station 21. In this capacity, the base station 23 functions chiefly as a relay station for data and voice signals. The base station 23 also supervises the quality of the link 32 and monitors the received signal strength from the mobile station 21.
A typical base station 23 as in the prior art is schematically illustrated in FIG. 2 which shows, as an example, the functional components of model number RBS 882 manufactured by Ericsson Telecom AB, Stockholm, Sweden for the CMS 8800 cellular mobile telephone system. A full description of this analog cellular network is provided in publication number EN/LZT 101 908 R2B, published by Ericsson Telecom AB.
A now common sight along many highways, the base station 23 includes a control unit 34 and an antenna tower 35. The control unit 34 comprises the base station electronics and is usually positioned within a ruggedized enclosure at, or near, the base of the tower. Within this enclosure are the radio control group 37, or RCG, an exchange radio interface (ERI) 38 and a primary power supply 41 for converting electric power from the AC grid to power the individual components within the base station 23, and a backup power supply 42.
The ERI 38 provides signals between the MTS0 25 and the base station 23. The ERI 38 receives data from the RCG 37 and transfers it to the MTSO 25 on a dedicated MTS0-BS link 45. In the reverse direction, the ERI 38 receives data from the MTSO 25 and sends it to the RCG 37 for subsequent transmission to a mobile station 21.
The radio control group 37 includes the electronic equipment necessary to effect radio communications. A functional block diagram of an RCG 37 as in the prior art is shown in FIG. 3. The configuration shown illustrates one control channel transmit/receive module (TRM) 51, a number of voice channel TRMs 52, and one signal strength receiver 53, as is a typical configuration required to serve one cell or sector of a cell. Each TRM 51, 52 includes a respective transmitter 54, receiver 55 and control unit 57. The TRMs 51, 52 are not typically frequency agile and operate instead on only one predetermined channel. Control signals from the ERI 38 are received by the individual control units 57. Voice and data traffic signals are routed over a separate interface to the ERI 38.
Each individual transmitter 54 for control and voice is connected to a transmit combiner 58. The transmit combiner combines all of the input signals onto a single output coupled through a coaxial cable 62 to the transmit antenna 63. Through the use of the combiner 58, up to 16 transmitters 54 can typically be connected to a common transmit antenna 63. The combiner 58 is used because there is often a premium for space on the masts and towers used to support the antennas. In an extreme case, one mast may be required to support over 100 radio channels.
On the receive side, each of two receive antennas 65 is coupled to a respective receive combiner 66A, 66B where the signals received are separated according to frequency and passed on to the individual receivers 55 in each of the TRMs 51, 52. The two receive antennas 65 are typically spaced 3 to 5 meters apart on the tower so that they may receive signals with uncorrelated fading patterns to thereby provide space diversity reception. There are many conventional techniques for both pre-detection and post-detection diversity which are described, for example, in Chapter 10 of the book entitled "Mobile Communications Engineering", by William C. Y. Lee, published by McGraw-Hill, 1992.
One visible feature of a typical base station 23 is the antenna tower 35. In order to achieve a reasonable coverage area, the antennas 63, 65 are desirably mounted at some distance above the ground. Referring now additionally to the prior art schematic plan view illustration of FIG. 4A, in rural areas the towers 35 are commonly located at the center of a cell 36 thereby providing omni-directional coverage. In an omni-directional cell, the control channel(s) and the active voice channel(s) are broadcast in all areas of the cell--usually from a single antenna. Where base stations 23 are more densely located, a sectorized antenna system may be employed as in the prior art, and shown by the schematic diagram of FIG. 4B. Sectorization requires directional antennas 70 having, for example, a 120 degree radiation pattern as illustrated in FIG. 4B. Each sector 71 is itself a cell having its own control channel(s) and traffic channel(s). Note that "channel" may refer to a specific carrier frequency in an analog system or to a specific carrier/slot combination in a hybrid TDMA/FDMA system, such as IS-54 and GSM.
FIG. 5A illustrates a typical antenna system as in the prior art and as discussed above. FIG. 5B illustrates two types of prior art antennas that have been heretofore discussed--an omni-directional antenna, such as a dipole 66, and a directional sector antenna 70 which further includes a reflector 64, for example. It being understood that transmit and receive antennas are typically of the same type for a given base station.
The use of scanning phased array antennas in cellular communications systems has been proposed. For example, Stapleton, et al., A Cellular Base Phased Array Antenna System, Proceedings of the 93rd IEEE VTC, pp. 93-96 describe a circular array of monopole radiating elements to provide 360 degree scanning capability. Stapleton's antenna is designed such that each radiating element has the potential of transmitting on every channel allocated to the cell.
It should be noted that passive microstrip arrays are also currently available for use with cellular base stations. For example, type no. 1309.41.0009 manufactured by Huber+Suhner AG of Herisau, Switzerland is a seven element linearly polarized flat panel passive antenna with a shaped elevation beam for use in cellular base stations. This array can replace the typical dipole antenna and is more suitable for locations on the sides of buildings or other flat surfaces. In application note 20.3, published by Huber+Shuner, it is shown that wide area coverage may be obtained via the use of power-splitters whereby portions of the signals are diverted to several individual panels.
Notwithstanding the above mentioned cellular base stations, there continues to exist a need in the art for base stations having enhanced cellular communications capacities and reduced cost.